Thursday, August 21, 2008

Our vision is to empower students, scholars, and professionals in intelligent knowledge networks to share knowledge and make it globally visible, accessible, and ever expanding.Background of Lalisio

The amount of knowledge increases every day, and with it the time and effort students, scholars, and professionals need to spend to find helpful materials or knowledgeable people with whom they can share, discuss, study, or research common points of interest. Due to the ever increasing amount of information, a great deal of valuable knowledge gets covered today and is ultimately lost.

For this reason, Lalisio offers easy ways to find, share, and connect knowledge worldwide making it more accessible and supporting research and education worldwide. Lalisio connects knowledge-seeking people from around the world with a unique search engine for all relevant data sources, i.e. books, Open Access articles, and publications in renowned journals. Lalisio puts a particular focus on a user-friendly design of its services and allows for a high degree of adaptability of its services to individual user needs. Lalisio is designing its services so that users are able to access them with personal computers as well as mobile devices – no matter whether they are at home, in a library, in a classroom, or in the office – they can use Lalisio to find answers to all kinds of questions. Lalisio integrates information, interaction, and information management, and is about community, content plus the valuable combination of both.

For this purpose, we cooperate with major providers of international literature databases: Top booksellers such as Amazon, Abebooks and Powell's are among our partners as well as open access repositories such as arXiv and PubMed Central. Due to the integration of open access repositories our users can find and access cutting-edge articles mostly free of charge. Based on our analyses of content from numerous sources, we develop helpful search suggestions and relevance indicators for your literature search and help you quickly identify the literature you really want.

Saturday, August 16, 2008

Bamboo is a multi-institutional, interdisciplinary, and inter-organizational effort that brings together researchers in arts and humanities, computer scientists, information scientists, librarians, and campus information technologists to tackle the question: How can we advance arts and humanities research through the development of shared technology services?

Project Bamboo launched in April 2008 with the first workshop at Berkeley. We held three additional instances of Workshop One (Chicago, Paris, and Princeton), and in the process met with over 360 arts and humanities faculty, computer scientists, librarians, information technologists, and others from over 90 colleges, universities, and private and public organizations who were interested in advancing arts and humanities research through shared technologies. Now the project is moving into its next stage -- analysis -- and we need your help. [snip]

Bamboo is an international effort that includes liberal arts colleges, community colleges, research universities, national consortia, disciplinary societies, industry and other organizations that are concerned with advancing the humanities through the development of shared digital technologies. If we move toward a shared services model, any faculty member, scholar, or researcher can use and reuse content, resources, and applications no matter where they reside, what their particular field of interest is, or what support may be available to them. Our goal is to better enable and foster academic innovation through sharing and collaboration.

Janet Broughton, Dean of Arts and Humanities and Professor of Philosophy, University of California, Berkeley

Gregory A. Jackson, Vice President for Information Technology and Chief Information Officer, University of Chicago

LEADERSHIP COUNCIL

Anthony Cascardi, Director, Doreen B. Townsend Center for the Humanities, and Professor of Comparative Literature, Rhetoric, and Spanish, University of California, Berkeley

James Chandler, Director, Franke Institute for the Humanities, and Professor of English Language and Literature, Committees on the History of Culture, Cinema and Media Studies, and Interdisciplinary Studies, and the College, University of Chicago

Charles Faulhaber, Director, Bancroft Library, and Professor of Spanish and Portuguese, University of California, Berkeley

Ian Foster, Director, Computation Institute, and Professor of Computer Science and the College, University of Chicago, and Associate Division Director of Mathematics and ComputerScience, Argonne National Laboratory

Judith Nadler, Director and University Librarian, The University of Chicago Library, University of Chicago

Martha Roth, Dean of the Division of the Humanities and Professor of Assyriology, Oriental Institute, Dept. of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, and the College, University of Chicago

Wednesday, August 13, 2008

From the Greek root Ology, it refers to every branch of learning.Connect, share, and learn from colleagues through papers, networked groups, collaborative tools and more.

[http://ologeez.stanford.edu/] Peer-review literature search, recommendation engine and group collaboration for academics and industry professionals.Developed by a Stanford graduate student to help find more relevant papers for his Ph.D. research in genetics. Tied into the science literature database, PubMed, and through user contributed peer-reviewed papers, it makes finding and discussing papers a lot easier. Other academic and industry databases to follow.

After developing the literature part, it was a natural progression to make a network for those using the site. Groups can be created to share publications, protocols, AJAX calendars, and create forum discussions. Local and University seminars and conferences can be uploaded and searched based on your academic interests.[http://www.crunchbase.com/company/ologeez]

Welcome to Laboratree. Laboratree is being developed in the Indiana University School of Medicine Bioinformatics Core primarily by the Mooney Lab.The Core/Mooney Lab assists a number of different groups on campus. Laboratree has been a tool used as a training ground to help new hires and students to brush up on their coding skills.Laboratree is a social networking tool for scientists and a research management tool. Laboratree allows you to grow you network by joining up with various colleagues, groups, and projects. Laboratree allows you to e-mail or send messages to all parts of your network. Laboratree allows you to manage a personal or group blog. Laboratree's latest feature allows you to share papers, documents, and other files with other people on Laboratree. NOTE: Laboratree is a work and progress ... .Laboratree is being developed by:Technical Leads:Brandon Peters, Sean Mooney

SciLink™ is an online community with the goal of helping you to discover scientists, authors, and relationships.

SciLink's network of 106,264,967 relationships is built by mining scientific data that exist on the web. Our databases currently contain over 5.8 million scientists and 14 million articles.[http://www.scilink.com/start.action]Find, connect, and sharewith other scientists in the SciLink network.

43,368 Users and Growing (August 13 2998)

New approach to networkingWith over 104 million relationships mined from literature, SciLink already knows who you're connected to.

Share your knowledgeMeet other scientists with common interests. Participate in group discussions and answer questions to help your colleagues.

Visit Our Job BoardFind jobs and on our comprehensive job board.

Latest science newsKeep up with scientific news and happenings from around the web, all in one place.

Tuesday, August 12, 2008

Research1 is an online community that allows researchers to collaborate with peers, and share information and digital media with the general public. Research1, developed by ResearchChannel, allows geographically dispersed teams to work together from anywhere in the world and it provides an ideal outlet for researchers to fulfil their public outreach requirements.

Research1 will provide public access to government-funded research, even while it is in progress, direct interaction with and between experts at the leading edge of their respective disciplines and participation in a community that encourages and supports a level of discourse not commonly available to those outside of academia.Primary functions

Serve as a premier outlet for researchers to fulfil their public outreach requirements

Foster interaction and communication between members of the public and researchers

Provide a collaborative platform to teams who could potentially be geographically (globally) dispersed

Key Benefits

Greater access to the fruits of governmentfunded research, even while it is in progress

Direct interaction with experts at the leading edge of their respective disciplines

Participation in a community that encourages and supports a level of discourse that is not commonly available to those outside of academia

How does it work?

Individual researchers or teams can establish a Research1 “Project Hub” for each research project. This public-facing webspace may contain up to 10 GB of text, photographs, audio and video that may be shared with the general public or act as a private collaboration space.

A simple set of Web-based tools are provided to create each Project Hub, upload and publish content, launch a blog to discuss ongoing work and facilitate interaction through project or discipline-specific email forums. Video files are automatically transcoded and thumbnailed for cross-platform viewing while maintaining the object in its original format for subsequent use.

What is AARNet doing?

Research 1 is currently in Beta testing. AARNet will use this period to determine a fit of the portal’s functionality to the needs and trends of Australian researchers for publicly disseminating research outcomes using digital media.

AARNet will use the outcomes of the beta testing and initial launch to determine how the portal can have regionalisation capability added as the portal populates over time. The primary focus is on using the portal as significant regional and international presence for Australian research.

The access to and use of this portal provides key opportunities for Australian researchers to both promote their own activities and view peer’s activities internationally.

Monday, August 11, 2008

SciSpace.net [http://www.scispace.net/] is a new collaborative tool established by NIEeS, designed to serve the needs of science. The growth of social network web sites such as MySpace and Facebook have shown the power of using the web to support interactions. These examples are focussed on social interactions, and enable individuals to publish information about themselves and communicate with friends and people who they discover share common interests. The technologies that underpin social networks can also be harnessed to support collaborations between researchers, and this is the goal of SciSpace.net.

SciSpace accounts are obtained by invitation from an existing member - use the browse button to find someone you know. If you can't find a member to invite you, send an email torequest-invite@scispace.net

Whether you are a geneticist, chemist, physicist, anthropologist, or other; The SciBog Social Network is a venue for scientists to communicate across several disciplines. Build your own profile, create your blog, and start networking today!

Sunday, August 10, 2008

Epernicus [http://www.epernicus.com/] is a professional networking platform for health and life scientists. Our goal is to connect researchers with their real world scientific networks, enabling them to find the resources they need to advance their work. We believe that having a useful network isn't necessarily about adding as many contacts as possible. In fact, most scientists already have a large network based on their current institution and their prior research advisors. The bigger challenge is tapping this network to find the right people with the right expertise at the right time. That's why we created Epernicus.

Scientists use Epernicus to search efficiently for expertise, methods, and materials in their network. Through our scientific profiles, researchers also maintain a professional web presence and stay connected to their current and former colleagues. As many of our members would say, when you're looking for something, it's always better to find it through someone in your network.

Based in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Epernicus is a resource built by scientists to advance research and scientific careers.

The HCAR KnowledgeMesh™ is a social networking and scientific mapping online community that is providing a platform and environment for life sciences and high technology professionals who represent industry, academia, government, investment, workforce, and support organizations to have quality interactions, thereby advancing R&D in the global community.Similar to LinkedIn™ and Facebook™, the HCAR KnowledgeMesh™ is user-driven and is designed to organically grow and develop overtime.

The HCAR KnowledgeMesh™ houses communities where people from around the globe can interact and collaborate on topics that are important to them. Features of the HCAR KnowledgeMesh™ include communities that are focused on particular research areas like oncology, clean technology, nanotechnology, and many other areas, as well as places and tools for the posting of individual and company profiles, events, blogs, bookmarks on scientific papers, presentations, and podcasts, to name a few.How does it benefit users?The HCAR KnowledgeMesh™ provides users with access to new information, ideas, contacts, projects, academic papers, technologies, investment options and many other opportunities that in some way touch the research park. Through this community users will have the opportunity to advance their research and development or their business model and their overall knowledge of the industry.

HCAR provides our resident organizations with facilitated access to business services and research resources that accelerate their growth and success in the global economy. [snip]

The HCAR KnowledgeMesh™ will house communities where people located around the globe, including you, can interact and collaborate on topics ... . Features of the HCAR KnowledgeMesh™ include organized communities that are focused on specific research areas like metabolic disease, solar power and nanotechnology, as well as tools that will allow ... [one] to post ... personal or company profile, promote events, write blogs, and share bookmarks on scientific papers, presentations, and podcasts, to name a few.

[snip]Profile and Community Dashboards - Various dashboards that offer a quick-glance of "going-on's" within your community and among your colleagues.File Permissions - The ability for you to decide who sees your content in your personal or community file repository.Colleague and Community Member Moderation - The ability to decide who can be your colleague and/or member of your community.Blogs - Journal entries where colleagues and community members can read and give feedback.

[snip]Dashboards - Dashboards offer a quick-glance of "going-on's" within your community and HCAR KnowledgeMesh. Here you can review your recent messages, accept invites, see recent blogs from your connections and your community or if you are a moderator of a community, you can see the list of invites and other tasks to complete.

Communities: You can now join or create communities! When you first go to communities, look for the link to join or create your own community. We already created a series of communities for you: Government, Industry, Life Sciences, and Real Estate. There are also some sub-communities. [snip]Messages: This is the internal messaging system within HCAR.[snip]The HCAR KnowledgeMesh™ is a virtual communications platform that will advance science and technology. Each node in the mesh represents an area of research expertise, investment preference, or business model, to name a few. The HCAR KnowledgeMesh™ has been built to encourage communication between those nodes to facilitate the sharing of experience, key findings, and unique expertise.[http://www.hcarknowledgemesh.com/]KnowledgeMesh includes profiles, wikis and other tools that were created by Intelmarx, a social software provider that caters to nonprofit organizations and higher education institutions.Video[http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tkQeMNYVBnQ]

Friday, August 8, 2008

A new Web site allows scientists to organize research papers online and share them with their colleagues, while doing some social networking on the side

Labmeeting [http://www.labmeeting.com/] the document management and networking site, which is free for individual scientists and students, allows researchers to upload PDF files of research papers and other documents, mark them, organize them, search them, recommend them to colleagues, and see what their peers are collecting. Each scientist has a profile page and can create groups, inviting the members of their labs to add their documents to a shared collection accessible from anywhere.Labmeeting is the brainchild of Mark Kaganovich, a Harvard alumnus with undergraduate degrees in biochemistry and computer science ... .

Utilizing emerging virtual collaboration technologies, librarians have a unique opportunity to find ways to both facilitate student learning and be an integral memberof science research teams. Martin Kesselman, RutgersUniversity, will discuss a Rutgers Second Life initiative that uses Selma Waksman’s work with soil microbiology to immerse science undergraduates into the ways scientists do research and help them develop a professional identity.Kesselman will also discuss the potential of virtual environments for librarians to collaborate with scientists across disciplinary and global boundaries.

Thursday, June 12, 2008

ResearchGATE [https://www.researchgate.net/]isa new free of charge web 2.0 platform designed for the need of researchers. With this new platform we want to change the world of science by providing a global and powerful scientific web-based environment, in which scientists can interact, exchange knowledge and collaborate with researchers of different fields.Sign up and be part of the first scientific network.

present yourself and your research projects

enroll, expand, and broaden your science network globally

exchange know-how and expertise

initiate collaboration

discuss your research limitation and get positive feedback

use our innovative tools and work environments for online collaboration

"It is obvious that anything a scientist discovers or invents is based on previous discoveries and inventions." (Lukas Foss).

[snip]

A vision of Science 2.0 is promising: Instead of disseminating scientific results in regularly scheduled and printed journal issues, now a continuous release of articles in online format will change and expedite the way new results are spread. Without anonymous review processes, open access journals or wiki-like concepts will assure the quality of science. Hidden conglomerates of various interests will give way to transparent and traceable new concepts of scientific impact measurements. Science is collaboration, so scientific social networks, wikis and other means of collaboration will facilitate and improve the way scientists collaborate.

It is clear that the change is already happening. Old fashioned lab note books have given way to Wikis, and the amount of open access journals is increasing. The tendency is that researchers no longer accept control of their publication by others. Raw research data is spread to the benefit of all.

[snip]

ResearchGATE is for scientists built by scientists driven by the concept of Science 2.0

Thursday, June 5, 2008

iBreadCrumbs: A Social Network for Researchers to Share Recorded URLs, Track Websites, Review Notes Online, and Encourage Online Collaborative Research.

iBreadCrumbs.com is a recording toolbar for your web browser. Similar to what a DVR does for tv, iBreadCrumbs.com records all the web pages you visit while you research. Save, review, and share your research with friends or colleagues. iBreadCrumbs allows students, researchers, and professors to organize the world's data into narrow research "breadcrumbs" or click-streams.

Interactive BreadCrumbs was created by two Cal State Fullerton entrepreneur students, Reuben Fine and Rey Marques. During their group research projects, they became extremely frustrated at the inefficiency and redundancy of gathering research and decided to solve the problem by creating iBreadCrumbs. They created this site in the hopes that students and researchers worldwide will be able to save and share their research with others in a fast and easy way.

Two California State University at Fullerton students have created a tool that allows researchers to share and annotate online research materials.

iBreadCrumbs is a toolbar download that works with Firefox. The software records all the pages you visit when you do research online and allows you to annotate them and share the materials with the users of any Web browser. The product is free.

Thursday, April 17, 2008

Elsevier has announced that it will be launching some improvements to its ScienceDirect service [http://www.sciencedirect.com/], which provides access to the publisher’s STM full-text journals and ebooks. The changes will include navigational improvements in screen layout, four options for filtering existing search results, and access to article comments, ratings, and social bookmarking options supplied by Elsevier’s free 2collab service [http://www.2collab.com/].

[snip]

The new navigational improvements include preview tabs on the results page and the table of contents that let searchers quickly view article abstracts, figures and graphs, and reference citations. No longer do searchers need to reload a page for each article that catches their interest. When viewing a full-text article, a toolbox feature lets searchers quickly click to key functions: Cited By, Download PDF, E-mail Article, etc.

[snip]

An "inline" reference preview shows links to referenced articles as the cursor passes over them in the body of the article. If available and authorized, the links can take the searcher directly to the referenced paper. No longer do searchers have to go to the bottom of an article to reach the citations. Sidi pointed out that searchers can reach non-Elsevier content through link resolvers. They can also now view the number of times articles were cited in Scopus, which includes citations for the articles it covers as well as the abstracts.

[snip]

In November 2007, Elsevier launched an online collaboration platform called 2collab. (For details, see Paula Hane’s NewsLink Spotlight, "Elsevier Creates Social Spaces for Researchers," [http://newsbreaks.infotoday.com/nbReader.asp?ArticleId=40102]. Even on Sept. 17, 2007, during the beta phase, a 2collab product developer announced that one of the project’s first goals was "integration with other Elsevier applications—such as ScienceDirect, Scopus. … For example, on ScienceDirect we would like to display the comments, ratings, and tags posted by 2collab users for relevant articles."

The addition of social bookmarking for articles and opening discussions on ratings and tags added by researchers is still scheduled for "a phased release over the coming months," according to the upgrade announcement. When completed, each article page will carry comments, ratings, and tags added by readers. The services supplied by 2collab already exist in Scopus. They allow both private (invitation only) and public groups.

[snip]

Barbara Quint is contributing editor for NewsBreaks, editor-in-chief of Searcher, and a columnist for Information Today.

Wednesday, April 16, 2008

ANN ARBOR, Mich. - April 15, 2008The Internet2 K20 Initiative today announced that it has launched a brand new social networking site called Muse [http://k20.internet2.edu/]

which seeks to significantly enhance collaboration, information-sharing and technology opportunities for the over 50,000 K-12 schools, community colleges, libraries and museums in 38 U.S.states that are now connected to the Internet2 backbone network. The site is also expected to provide a better bridge between the U.S. K20 community and its international counterparts worldwide. Within the short time sincel aunching, the new site has already experienced significant uptake within the community.

"The Internet2 K20 community has traditionally embraced advanced technology to facilitate new opportunities for students at all levels to experience a richer environment for teaching and learning. The development of a social networking web resource is a natural progression for our community which has long sought more efficient ways to share experiences, ideas,resources, projects and collaborations across geographic boundaries," said Louis Fox, Director, Internet2 K20 Initiative and Associate Vice President, University of Washington. "We have experienced strong use since the site has gone live and expect its adoption to continue especially as functionality enabling deeper collaboration is added. In the future, we see Muse as a potentiallyhelpful resource for the greater Internet2 community to enhance project collaborations on a global scale and facilitate cross-disciplinaryengagement."

Muse was developed by University of Washington student web programmers under the leadership of James Werle, Associate Director, Internet2 K20 Initiative,University of Washington, and Jennifer Oxenford, Associate Director, MAGPI. The site expands upon the core code of Drupal, an open source content management platform, and provides many of the Web 2.0 features found in popular social networking sites. Practitioners from the broad K20 community can set up individual andinstitutional profiles, describe projects, share resources, and create direct connections with their peers both regionally, nationally and internationally. The site also allows online communities to be created and scoped to a specific geographic area. This feature is geared for groups of organizations looking to share resources just within their immediate region while still participating in the global Muse community

[snip]

While the site continues to rapidly expand in use, Muse plans to introduce the ability for users to create topically-based communities, chat in real time about projects and interests, receive email "Museletters" tailored to those specific interests and provide RSS feeds to broadcast information on new users, projects and organizations as the site grows. In doing so, the site intends to provide the community the ability to develop stronger, more comprehensive collaboration groups and to promote the more rapid adoption of advanced networking applications among this unique set of Internet2 users.

Muse builds on the success of the nationwide Internet2 K20 Initiative in bringing together Internet2 member institutions and innovators from primary and secondary schools, colleges and universities, libraries and museums to extend new technologies, applications and advanced content to alleducational sectors across the country.

To bring innovators in K-12, community colleges, universities, libraries, and museums into appropriate regional, national, and international advanced networking efforts, via the "Sponsored Education Group Participant" (SEGP) process.

To encourage and help sustain partnerships among these education institutions, the private sector, and government.

To enhance teaching and learning by facilitating projects that explore the ways in which advanced network applications, services, tools, and digital content can extend access to education and educational resources.

To develop mechanisms for timely communication across all educational sectors and regions in order to enable quick, pervasive technology diffusion.

Sunday, March 30, 2008

People Are The Bioeconomy: Social Media For Engaged Information ConversationsGerry McKiernan, gerrymck@iastate.eduLibrary, Iowa State University, 152 Parks, Ames, IA 50011

While a substantial portion of the primary literature on alternative energy is published in scholarly journals, significant research is also reported in conference publications, dissertations, reports, theses, white papers, and other “gray” literature. This presentation will discuss this literature and the efforts of the Iowa State University Library to identify and acquire key gray publications on the production, use, and impact of biofuels, to support university scientific, technical, and sociological research initiatives. Two alternative energy blogs established to promote core publications and resources to a world community will also be profiled. Major current and future research alternative energy projects at Iowa State will be described as well.

The presentation will conclude with speculation on the potential use of social networking services, such as 2collab, chemistry.org/exchange, and the Nature Network to facilitate and support university/industry/government communication, collaboration, and coordination of bioenergy projects.

Pronetos is a social network for scholars and an Open Access publisher. It provides an intuitively designed, real-time, web based community platform that facilitates mass collaboration and democratizes content for global distribution among academics with the ability to archive and search that content. With Pronetos, ideas are shared at the speed of thought, and those who create them control them.

Pronetos is home to communities of every academic discipline – a global think-tank of the leaders in every field. Pronetos makes it easy for scholars to stay connected with thier colleagues, wherever they may be. Pronetos is a place for scholars to network, and build and share ideas with the greatest minds in their field.

Pronetos is a content repository that allows readers and authors to interact and build new ideas. Connect to scholars in your field as you would at a conference, except this conference is attended by scholars from across the globe. Make interdisciplinary contacts. Exchange ideas. Collaborate. Gain exposure for your research. Stay current on trends in your field. Join Disciplines, post discussions, upload articles, read, comment, and rate others’ articles.

Pronetos is the premier gathering place for scholars to collaborate, network, and publish their ideas. Watch in 2008 as we roll out our suite of Open Access publishing services. Publish your own manuscripts with global distribution, create custom textbooks for your classes, and much more.

Saturday, March 15, 2008

A crop of websites is making networking among scientists easier than everCompared with crafting computational expertise or sharpening gene-splicing skills, networking is one talent many scientists are slow to hone. Luckily, a crop of new websites is encouraging even the most reclusive researchers to rendezvous with colleagues without leaving the lab.The success of social-networking websites such as MySpace, Facebook and LinkedIn shows the power of the Internet not only to cultivate, but to capitalize on, friendships. Although online networks may seem impersonal, they can do something for scientists that a handshake cannot: highlight common research interests without leaving the comfort of your desk. Say goodbye to name tags and awkward introductions — say hello to profiles and blogs. In the search for jobs, mentors, collaborators or data, these cyber-social mixers are revealing new ways to gain career advice, create collaborations and share resources

SIE PRODUCTIONS/ZEFA/CORBIS

A growing number of websites, including Nature Network (a product of the Nature Publishing Group, the parent company of Nature)

are coming online to meet more specific needs. Although these sites reach out to a broad spectrum of disciplines, scientists can create more focused forums, groups or blogs to spark more specialized discussions.[snip]

Scientists with common interests can connect across long distances and disparate scientific cultures.[snip]

With increased funding for cross-disciplinary science, many networks are experimenting with ways to help members collaborate.[snip]

Building A Critical Mass

[snip]

Within3 [https://www.within3.com/] charges only those hospitals, charities or medical schools that use its service to create a networked sub-community, called a channel. Within3 provides tools for channel partners to document their work as well as conduct polls and surveys or share documents.

[snip]

Some sites do more than just bring people together; they let researchers share data, methodologies and protocols. MyExperiment.org [http://www.myexperiment.org/], funded by the UK government, lets users share workflows: the customary protocols for standardizing data, running simulations or conducting statistical analysis on large data sets. Standardized protocols for manipulating large data sets can be tweaked for specific purposes. Users can comment on their usefulness and link to other work-flows of interest.

[snip]

Tag Along With ThisBetter yet, tagging — assigning a keyword or rating to a bookmarked online workflow or data set — allows myExperiment to connect users with similar resources that may be of interest. NanoHub [http://www.nanohub.org/], part of the NSF-funded Network for Computational Nanotechnology, lets users rate the courses and simulation tools it hosts.[snip]

On NanoHub, tagging uses the collective wisdom of the community to introduce you to appropriate simulation software," says Noshir Contractor, director of the Science of Networks in Communities lab

at Northwestern University, Evanston, Illinois. He says scientists can expect more such sites streamlining their ability to find the right tools and algorithms.

Networking may get more efficient, says Contractor. Its unrealized potential is the ability to take data from networks that currently reside separately, and mash, or merge, them. He says users will soon be able to collectively mine the data of projects funded by several US agencies to see who is collaborating on what topics.

And of course, networking sites have their limits. Although they can facilitate connections, blogs aren't likely to become a wholesale substitute for a few beers after work any time soon.

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About Me

I formerly had primary responsibilities for Collection Development, Instruction, and Reference and Research Services in Chemical and Biological Engineering; Civil, Construction, and Environmental Engineering; Industrial and Manufacturing Systems Engineering; and Mechanical Engineering; Alternative Energy; Environment Sciences with the Library of Iowa State University. I was employed from April 1987 to July 2014.
Prior to joining ISU, I served as the Museum Librarian at the Carnegie Museum of Natural History, Pittsburgh, and as an Assistant Librarian with the Library of the New York Botanical Garden in the Bronx, my hometown.
I received my Master of Science degree in Library Science from the University of Illinois-Urbana-Champaign in 1975, and my undergraduate degree in Anthropology from Lehman College of the City University of New York, The Bronx.